The Night of Mockers
by ChekhovTheTroper
Summary: Three alternate movieverse versions of the White family celebrate Halloween. One of them is a curious sinner; the other is too far astray on the path to the roadhouse. And Eve was weak.


**DISCLAIMER: Any adaptation of ****_Carrie _****is not in my possession. Now, excuse me while I try to telekinetically crack my mirror.**

_***IMPORTANT NOTE* This chapter takes place within the 1976 movieverse.**_

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"Momma, where do you think Halloween came from?"

Carrie White's mother, Margaret White, disconnects from the ambiguous thoughts that spin in her head and stares at her daughter. Carrie withdraws from her question, fidgeting against her chair. Her mother was previously sewing a dress that resembled a slovenly-stitched vestment in the aftermath, and Carrie had worked on some of her sick-homework that would be due on Monday; but now they're both sitting at the dinner table, submerged in ungainly silence and they haven't even prayed yet.

"Don't ask a question like that, Carrie," Margaret replies, plucking at the lace cuffs at the end of her sleeves. Carrie blinks at her, noticing that this is one of the few times she's seen her mother dressed in white.

"Please, Momma? I just wanna know."

In actuality, Carrie knows where the holiday came from on an imaginative level. As the rants and holy rollin' have risen and fallen in born-again cycles, Carrie has a colorful theory on how Halloween came to be: perhaps Jesus simply enjoyed the children's trickery near the end of Harvesting Season. Perhaps a throng of tomfools passed His way and instead of punishing them, He gave them the last of the harvest-fruit as a token of good spirit. Carrie knows this sounds stupid, but amongst the frowning faces that bow underneath the cross and linger above a yawning inferno, she wants to envision something pleasant, something that really could salvage her virtue.

However, the faces' stoicism never falter. The enchanting portal she tries to construct is now laughably threadbare, and the only salvaging factor is Momma's irate accuracy. The harvest-fruit is left untouched, as a sinner's hand could soil it easily; no, Jesus never looked upon a slobbering tomfool, but instead—

"Treachery!" she exclaims, although her eyes are caught in a faraway glaze. "The bloodstained infidelities of the Lord's doubters. 'Twas those doubters that called upon snakeskin, and from that snakeskin came the blood of women with big bellies, and from that came bastards that murdered their own as if they weren't astray enough."

_But not every one is, not every belly carries bastards._

"They follow you, yes They do. They _always_ do. The witch's nose is that of Eve's, warty and shriveled from sniffing out the Man-Smell. The pumpkins grin because they know you so well, and they can see that you don't wear anything to protect that place, or any other place. Ghosts of forlorn believers, poltergeists that wait until you sleep in Darkness to take you away—and take you _They will_—and the skeletons cackle without voices and touch the open wounds without remorse. We _all _do, we _all _touch and take and walk away with cancer in our big bellies—!"

"Momma."

Margaret's rant dissolves at the sound of her daughter's voice. Carrie's eyes are wide and dumbly surprised, like a deer caught in the headlights. Margaret blinks at the centerpiece: it is a circle of unlit candles surrounding a handmade carven figurine of Baby Jesus in his unsullied cradle of hay and cloth.

"Momma, we don't have to talk about this if you don't wanna."

Margaret prepares a relieved response, but she is interrupted by the sound of fervent knocking on the screen door. At first, she believes it to be another cluster of puppy-eyed children asking for candy. Normally, Margaret handles them with matron sensitivity, but not without the repentant defeat and the subtle plea for them to pray when they return to their misguided parents. However, it is instead two nameless boys from Carrie's high school, and the pity in Margaret's eyes evolves into rage.

"Hey, chapel-sluts!" one of them calls, spitting at the screen door. "You fuck Jesus's brains out, yet? You fuck Him, yet, Ol' Praying Whites?"

The other doesn't add anymore fuel to the fire, but he flicks his tongue at Carrie and blithely humps the palm of his hand.

Carrie sinks in her seat, trying to ignore their lewdness. Margaret's face is an unchanging thunderhead, but she does snatch her King James Bible from the kitchen counter and stalks towards the door. She opens it, narrows her eyes, and swings her heavy black book against one of the boy's faces. He curses, stumbling backwards as the other guy balks from her. She swings at him, as well, but when she misses, all she does is spit in his face.

"So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus," Margaret recites gravely. If Carrie remembers correctly, that verse comes from Romans 8:1.

The two boys turn to leave the porch, but not before one of them flips Margaret off and shouts: "You schizophrenic _bitch!_"

"And may you rot at the Lord's feet!" Margaret shouts before slamming the door, hugging her Bible against her breast. Carrie sighs, face burning from commonplace embarrassment. She tugs at the fluted lace on her blouse's collar. Her mother's eyes wander to the ceiling. "These Godless Things…how I send you to such a place is beyond me!"

"You want me to light the candles for dinnertime, Momma?"

"Yes, can you please do that for—?" Margaret makes a graceless turn on her heels and is stunned to see the candles ablaze so quickly. "It's almost like you didn't even budge."

"I guess not," Carrie murmurs, laughing although Margaret's tone is barren of any humor. As her mother rejoins her at the table, Carrie wonders if she even _did _get up to grab the lighter…

"Join me, my child," Margaret says dourly, outstretching her hand towards Carrie's. "Let us pray."

"Yes, Momma."

Carrie takes her mother's hand and closes her eyes. With Margaret being the clergy and Carrie the laity, the pious blather commences. She speaks to Him of sinful children with their wanton costumes and candies that aren't as sweet as that of righteousness; she most heartily repents for the rancorous tableau her daughter tries to fit into. Of all things, she makes mention of a man who took the name of the Lord away with the lingering stink of roadhouse whiskey on his breath and then left to do so with another woman. Each syllable spoken is an earthquake, rattling her teeth and causing the perfect façade of the Holy Ones to crack.

As Carrie listens to this, she considers the fact that perhaps this isn't gibberish to her mother. Non-gibberish rolling, and nevertheless rueful; sometimes, Carrie can't even understand what her mother is _saying_. She understands the context of her invocations as well as the filthy truths she speaks of, but the thought of trying to decipher her mother's cryptic language sounds too tiresome. _Get out of the road, Carrietta, _she thinks to herself. _No headlights, nothing too bright, it's good, everything's really good._

She resumes at the sound of the Amen, and now that the vespers are completed, Carrie opens her eyes. Her mother's face is alight from the candles' torrid glare. She's back in the road again, and it looks like a Peterbilt is heading her way.

"The closet…go to your closet and pray."

"Ohuh?" Carrie gulps, feeling as though she's plunged from a plane and the release system is stuck. "Momma, what did I do?"

"Nothing." Margaret flounders, jaw hanging ajar as she speaks.

"Are you…are you not hungry for apple cake? I know you didn't like how the last one turned out, but maybe—?"

"The _closet_. Go to your closet and pray. Ask to be guided."

Ask to be guided, but not forgiven. Carrie figures that there's no such thing, so she nods meekly and ambles towards the closet. It is unlocked, and the leering scents of talcum powder and old wood greets her. Margaret closes the door, and the faint _click _of the lock is unsettling to Carrie.

Saint Sebastian's eyes are blank and reproachful, slathered with anguished tears. The arrows protrude from his skin, thin runnels of blood dribbling from his neck and chest. The dying bulb that looms over Carrie has been taken out, but another redundant pattern of melting candles (they were lit before Carrie was sent to the closet) compensates for it with a tentative glow. Her Junior Followers' Bible isn't present, and Carrie wonders if her mother has finally given into her plea and tossed it away. Carrie knows that isn't true and part of her feels as though a kick in the pants would be much-deserved for thinking such thoughts. Besides, she would've written her own Bible if it meant keeping her daughter from falling off a blazing tightrope into the Eternal Pit.

Carrie's hands knit together awkwardly and she rests her chin on her knuckles, raking through her cluttered repertoire of prayers. She prayed for their Father, hallowed be Thy name; she prayed for the blessings of the Litany of the Saints, and all Divine Praises that she feels can complete her. _Benedictum nomen Mariae, Virginis et Matris. Gloria in excelsis Deo. Christi crux est mea lux._ Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins…right?

Carrie does not wish to answer that question, and she pretends that she doesn't hear her mother's fraught sobbing and somewhat sinister bargaining.

She thumbs at something bulky in her skirt's pockets. A chocolate bar rests inside, and thankfully, it hasn't melted yet. Carrie still remembers that she'll have to thank Mrs. Garrison for lending her something from her Trick-r-Treat bowl. Carrie pulls it out and unwraps it, but only manages to eat half of it. She hasn't had anything to eat today other than burnt bread crusts, and her stomach snarls at her like the angry dog that always charges down the road. However, the taste doesn't settle well in her stomach, so she wraps it in the crumpled plastic and hides it in her pocket again.

A curious finger touches her lips. Chocolate puddles at both corners of her mouth, and although she wipes it away quickly, she sees the smudges on her fingertips. She giggles at it, but it's more an affrighted ripple, like ripples in a shallow pond. It isn't that funny, but something struck her with charming oddness. She's spent her life praying for breathing improperly (and there _was _a time where her mother beat her for eating contraband sweets), but here she is, gorging on generic flavors that her mother deemed disgustingly saccharine. If only—

Margaret shrieks. Something clashes against the closet door. Carrie, panicking, charges towards the door. Somehow, the lock slides out of the rusted cylinder, and the door flings open with ease. Carrie weakens immediately, trying to discern the scene before her. Her mother is clutching at her flyblown auburn hair. A constellation of scratches are marked into her cheeks, fresh and bleeding. Her hands are hooked and shaking, as if grasping for the ultimate revelation. Broken glass is scattered at Carrie's feet from where one of the candles was slung.

"Momma…stay there, Momma." Carrie warns. "There's broken glass everywhere."

Margaret does not hear her daughter, as she is caught in an exhilarating trance. Throes of inner knowledge circulate through her, and as she turns to face her daughter, it appears that she no longer sees the child she brought into this sinful world, but a cancerous reminder of parking lots and thorny bushes and roadhouse whiskey that the men drank as the harlots danced.

Without a word, she charges towards her daughter, letting out another scream. Carrie yelps, pivoting back into the closet, but catching her mother when her ankle gives out. Margaret wrangles with Carrie, trying to free her arms from her daughter's grip. Carrie has a surprising amount of strength for such a mousy girl, but to say she is unafraid would be offensively silly. Carrie shushes her mother, trying to calm her down; however, her mother's frantic cries for help submerge her attempts.

As Carrie tries to push themselves out of the cramped hell, she slams the door with her foot. The sound is louder than she expects, but it somehow is enough to assuage this stranger in their familial household. Margaret's head rests against Carrie's neck, soundless whispers wilting from her mouth. Carrie carefully guides her to the couch, fluffing the pillow beneath her mother's head.

"I'll clean up in the morning," Carrie says. "Let me get a rag for your cuts."

Margaret does not look her daughter in the eye, as a catatonic reminiscence is still amongst her. However, she speaks, in an incompetent cycle: "Never once did…never once did…"

"I know, Momma. I know."

Carrie doesn't know. She doesn't know how these family laws came to be, nor does she know how to picture Jesus engaging in gleeful pranks when the burning pockmarks in the scripture still haunt her. However, she decides that she doesn't want to know for today. She soaks a dirty dishrag in lukewarm water and veers towards her mother, whose hands are still shaking and her wounded chastity is still told in whispers. Carrie kneels down and presses the cloth against one bleeding cheek and then the next.

"Are you feeling better, Momma?" Carrie asks, trying to steer away from tonight's events. By the time she asks, her mother answers with a bovine snore. Carrie giggles again, both mollified and unnerved by the sudden sleepiness that overpowered such a powerhouse woman. However, she yawns into the cloth and decides that she'll rest in one of the overstuffed chairs along with her mother. She'll also finish her chocolate bar and dispose of the evidence before she wakes up. Simple chores, no more taunters, and a sleeping wolf in the living room—that sounds good enough, for now.

The remaining candlelight melts away; the closet door closes with a soft sound. Carrie didn't even glance at them.

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**A/N: I've always wondered how all three movieverses of _Carrie _would "celebrate" Halloween? And by celebrate, I mean feature a chapter that examines Carrie's awkwardness and Margaret's holy rollin'? Well, I figure we should read on to find out. I am not doing a chapter based on the _The Rage _b/c, to be honest, that movie was so half-assed, I try to pretend that it doesn't even exist.**

**So, I had fun writing this chapter. I've never felt so angry over something that shouldn't even be a big deal. Unfortunately, it is, and writing is what soothes me. I had fun trying to conjure up strange descriptions like Stephen King does. Some people say that I write just like him, and according to 80% of the people that has read his stuff, that's a big compliment! :)**

**Well, I finally cracked my mirror…but I didn't use my mind. Please excuse me while I try to blot the blood on my hands and wrists before I…I…*faints from blood-loss***

**-Peace from the gun-troper**


End file.
